First Topic - NIHR’s Efforts to Protect Human Rights13 Preface: 1. The provisions of Law No. (26) of 2014 establishing the National Institution for Human Rights, amended by Decree Law No. (20) of 2016, affirm the role of the NIHR in the field of human rights protection by receiving complaints related to human rights, and conducting field visits to monitor human rights conditions. 2. As Article No. (12) of the same Law stipulates in paragraph (e) thereof that the NIHR has the competence to “monitor cases of human rights violations, conduct the necessary investigation, and direct the attention of the competent authorities to them while submitting proposals related to initiatives aimed at putting an end to these cases, and, when necessary, to express an opinion on the position of those authorities and their reactions.” Paragraph (f) of it stipulates its authority to “receive, study and research complaints related to human rights, and refer what the NIHR deems to be referred to the competent authorities, while actively following up on them, or informing those concerned of procedures to be followed and assisting them in taking them or assisting in settling them with the concerned authorities. 3. Regarding field visits being one of the monitoring methods granted to the NIHR, paragraph (g) of Article No. (12) thereof stipulates its mandate to “carry out announced and unannounced field visits, to monitor human rights conditions in correctional institutions, places of detention, labor gatherings, and health and educational homes, or any other public place suspected of being a site of human rights violation.” These terms of reference are entirely related to the role played by the NIHR in the field of human rights protection. 4. This text confirms the need to expand the competencies in the field of human rights protection in a manner consistent with international decisions in this regard, and that the required protection should not be limited to receiving complaints only, but extends to carrying out the process of tracking and monitoring the situation of human rights and documenting it by various means and methods, as the monitoring process is necessary to ascertain the degree and extent of the state's compliance with its legal or international obligations related to human rights. 5. In this Topic, the complaints received by the NIHR, the assistance it provided, and monitoring cases related to a few other human rights that were not covered in Chapter Three of this report will be addressed in five requirements, as follows: 13 A number of complaints received by the NIHR and assistance provided as well as monitoring cases pertaining to various human rights will be touched on under this topic, which are not included in Chapter Three of this Report. 87